Life
by Tosa
Summary: Drugs, adultery, and death. Misunderstandings, arguments, and a dramatic scene at an airport. In other words, what should be the makings of an epic romance. Should. But this is life, and nothing's ever fair. 3-shot. Complete. AU. FrUK, USUK
1. The Death

**Prologue**

Once upon a time, a boy named Francis and a boy named Arthur hated each other. Despite this, they shared a lot of things, including friends, time-outs, and detention slips. Ironically, the more they hated each other, the more time they ended up spending together.

High school came around, and the boys spent that time dropping acid and snorting lines. It was in the midst of a high that the two had first had sex, and afterwards, to save face, they declared themselves a couple.

Time passed, and the more that it did, the more Francis forgot that he was supposedly putting up a front. He began to hate Arthur less. The more time they spent together, the less hostile their insults were, settling instead into affectionate teasing.

And then college, and then damn Alfred came to the rescue. He got Arthur cleaned up and then whisked him away, leaving Francis behind.

Francis searched tirelessly for Arthur, calling up many an unpleasant favor to seek him out. He looked in all the various rehabs, brownstones, and office buildings where he thought he might find him. He crawled through dust and blood, dragging himself to every joint in the city, and at last, Francis finally found him.

When Francis found Arthur, he pretended that he hadn't been looking and that the meeting was pure fate, an event deigned by the cosmos to happen. When Francis found Arthur, he was still with Alfred, and had been for years. It was true love, Arthur said quietly, but then, even true love loses its charm occasionally.

Francis and Arthur's affair started on the assumption that Francis was clean (he wasn't) and while not necessarily better for Arthur than Alfred, he still wasn't bad. (Of this, he is still unsure.)

It was decided that they would keep their love affair secret and meet someplace green.

...

**Chapter One**

It had happened in the smallest possible way and it went by unnoticed for the longest time, because for all Francis's past promiscuity, he was always very, very careful. It's just that when it came to his other hobbies, he forgot. One accidental prick of a finger, a lot of swearing, and he injected the needle into his arm and rode off into the sunset, feeling eerily in love with the strangers he was with. Afterwards, he remembered little more than ill lighting and dust motes, yet suddenly here he was, diagnosed with the AIDs virus. Not just HIV; full on AIDs, because it had taken him ages to think something was wrong and to remember the incident. He just so rarely experimented with drugs that involved needles that he hadn't thought of it, he supposed.

By the time he realized, it was too late. Not for him to get treated or anything, but to prevent the spread. Because in that time period, he had spread it to his now ex-lover, Arthur Kirkland. And he in turn unwittingly gave it to his boyfriend of the time, who he was cheating on with Francis.

The boyfriend's name was Alfred Jones. He was tall, blonde-haired and blue-eyed, and muscular, which roughly translated into "classically handsome". Francis was also classically handsome, but in an artsy-er way, with a French accent supplementing for muscles.

Classically handsome or no, the two were entirely different, with the main difference being that Francis was on one side of the door to Arthur's life and Alfred was on the other. Literally. And judging by the poison in Alfred's expression, he wasn't going to be letting Francis in any time soon.

"What do you want?"

Oh, he was so not going to make this easy for him. Francis steeled a bit of courage and then smiled. "Is Arthur home?"

"It's done, Francis," Alfred said, expression flat. "It has been. For a long time."

Oh, God. "Well, uh, you see, what I have to tell him has to do with you, too..."

Alfred closed his eyes, his face begging some higher power for strength. He looked silly, gripping the doorjamb like that, as though Francis was going to attempt to fight his way in; as though he, Alfred, was going to have to valiantly fend him off. With a sigh, Alfred spoke.

"Look, Francis. It's over. You don't have to bother anymore. Arthur's better now. He forgave you. I forgive you. Now go home."

It certainly didn't sound as though Alfred forgave him. Whether he would or not didn't matter, though. Francis and Arthur may have cheated, but Alfred had stolen Arthur first. And Francis wasn't ever forgiving him for that.

He wet his lips. "Well. Err. That's really all well and good, but while I'd love to have that relationship talk again - hopefully this time without you breaking my nose before I get any point across... That's not what I'm here for."

Alfred squared his shoulders. "Oh, yeah? What exactly did you come for, then?"

He'd wanted to say it to Arthur, but there'd only been a slim possibility of that happening from the beginning, anyway. Francis braced himself for the reaction as he spoke. "I have AIDs."

Alfred's facial features shifted like a stack of binders, precariously perched on top of each other, and now disturbed, they began to slide into an expression of dawning fright. This, Francis thought, is the look of a man whose life is spinning out of control. Francis would know: he'd been making that face not too long ago, when he'd found out.

"Arthur... and you... might want to get checked out."

"Is this a joke?" Alfred demanded. He was angry now, but his expression was tepid and subject to change rapidly. Francis was almost at a loss for words; after all, he hadn't expected Alfred to cry, but it looked as though he would.

"No," Francis replied. "I'm dead serious." On reflection, "dead" was not the best word choice.

Alfred slammed the door in his face.

...

Francis went to a place where it was green and sat on a bench. At noon, Arthur came. They hadn't planned that day to meet there; he simply materialized.

Arthur took a breath. "It's been a while." When Francis didn't acknowledge him, he went on. "I'm talking about this place - where we used to meet? It's been a while."

"I get it," Francis said sourly. "I remember. I was there all those times, too."

Arthur ignored his mood. "You know, some days I'd just come here and sit, even when we hadn't had anything planned. I'd just wait for you, and you'd always come." Francis didn't respond. He knew all this already. Instead, he watched a pair of lovers down the path try to roller skate. Their knees trembled as they righted themselves, and the moment one went to let go of the other, both parties would fall. Out of the corner of his eye, Arthur sniffled back tears.

With a pat on Francis's knee, he tried to cheerfully chirp the words, "Forgive yourself, you silly berk! Everybody dies sometime. Now we just happen to be dying a little bit faster."

The only thing Francis could bring himself to say was this: "If you had left Alfred that time I'd asked, he wouldn't have to die, too."

He wanted Arthur to retaliate. Hit him, yell, berate, be exasperated at Francis's dramatics. He wanted Arthur to acidly criticize his habit of drug use for getting them into this mess - then he remembered that Arthur thought he had been clean for years.

Instead, Arthur was crying, because this was a lot to take in right now, even if he'd thought it all before. He buried his face in his hands as sobs racked his frame, shoulders rising and falling with the heave of each uneven breath.

And Francis, stupid Francis, would not console him. "I can't believe you're getting worked up over an idiot."

Arthur misunderstood him. "He's not an idiot - I love Alfred." Then, after a particularly loud sniffle, "Besides, I'm not crying over what you said. I'm crying because you said that."

Then Arthur went on weeping for Francis's tragically hard and brittle soul, and Francis went on not consoling him. Because that had been the deal with Alfred. Not to touch Arthur.

...

The green place began to curve and disappeared as Francis returned to the world of the living.

His phone was ringing excessively, and it was only ten in the morning. Battling a vicious hangover, he reached for it, imagining that with every pound of the headache in his skull he could feel his bloodstream pulsing. Maybe he wasn't even imagining it; maybe it was part of the AIDs virus, that he got to feel the natural processes of his body which were going to betray him. "Hello?"

"Arthur's plane leaves Monday. If you want to say good bye, you should come over before then."

Francis rubbed the sleep and alcohol from his eyes. "Why isn't he the one telling me this?"

Alfred must be able to tell he was drunk, because Francis heard him sigh in a far off sort of way, as though he had momentarily pulled away from the receiver in his frustration. The next words were loud and clear. "Francis, look. I don't have time for your bullshit. It's officially scheduled for Saturday, and that's when everyone's coming over, but you can drop by Sunday if you want."

Wait, what was scheduled for Saturday? Something began to dawn on Francis. "Are you having a party of some sort?" Why?

On the other end, Alfred made noises of irritation. "Do I have to spell it out for you? He's going away. He's being sent back to England, where his family wants him."

A going away party, then. Bon voyage forever, my friend. However, something began to niggle at the very edge of Francis's mind. When he couldn't immediately figure out what it was, Francis guessed that, by Alfred's tone, he had already known all these details before and had just forgotten.

"Whatever. I'm not going." Francis hung up and rolled onto his side.

...

"I don't need him," Francis sniffled. His eyes were watering. but it had nothing to do with Arthur. It was just the fumes. Honest.

Gilbert hacked up a cloud of smoke. "This shit blows, man. Seriously, the small stuff doesn't do anything for me anymore."

Antonio nodded sleepily in agreement. "I'm hungry."

They looked at Francis, seeking supplement to their idle comments, but their friend's attention was thoroughly fixed on a random poster Gilbert's wall. They doubted he was actually seeing which one he was looking at. Inanimate and thus unaffected, David Hasselhoff grinned back at them.

Gilbert scowled. "When are you going to get over Arthur, anyways? Antonio, you shut up!"

The other man had been fervently hushing his friend. Now, he sighed. "Gilbert, it's barely been a week. He hasn't had time to heal."

"I've got AIDs," Francis grunted. "I'm never going to heal."

Antonio looked at him very sympathetically. "I meant about, y'know, Arthur."

Francis sighed, laying himself down by bending his knees and leaning onto his elbows. "That hardly matters. I don't need to say good bye. I already did a long time ago, anyway, when he went back to Alfred. Stupid Alfred."

"That's so sad," Antonio said, voice cracking. Untouched, Gilbert raised an eyebrow. "Uh, I think it's kind of late for good byes anyway." Antonio elbowed him in the ribs and Gilbert whipped his head to the side to glare fiercely at him.

Brushing off their comments with a wave of the hand, Francis replied, "Oh, no, no. The going away party was on Saturday, but Alfred said I could come Sunday. But I'm not going. Arthur can just get on his stupid plane and go to England without so much as a fucking farewell shag."

Both friends became very quiet. Even Gilbert could tell that there was something off.

"Francis?" Antonio asked, cautiously. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"Yeah, I think whatever you've had, you've had way too much," Gilbert snorted. "Because Arthur is already gone." He was interrupted by Antonio's elbow again. He amended, "Cause it's, um, past Sunday, man. It's Monday."

Francis bolted into a sitting position. "But that means-" He stopped, then scrambled to his feet. "What time is it?"

In the time it took for Francis to look for and find the wall clock, both Antonio and Gilbert had checked their wrists. And realized neither one of them was wearing a watch. Francis swore. "Shit! How long does it take to get to the airport?"

Antonio's head snapped up, alarmed. "You're not actually going to go, are you?"

"I have to," Francis responded solemnly. Before his friends could say otherwise, he was out the door and sprinting.

...

Francis had sort of forgotten that he needed a boarding pass when he went through security. Thankfully, he'd had a story on hand about how he was meeting up with his friends, the Smiths, who had his ticket, and an ID to prove that he was in fact Francis Bonnefoy.

When that didn't work, he sprinted through the checkpoint and hid in the women's bathroom until the coast was clear. Damn computer, ratting him out for not having a ticket. Damn new anti-terror regulations.

Keeping his face low, Francis searched the flight schedule for Arthur's plane, and when he found it, he began his search for terminals marked Air London. He was in almost complete and utter ecstasy at his luck as he raced up the escalator (disrupting some luggage on the way), dreaming of the result of this perfectly romantic gesture. He bet that Alfred had never done anything this magnificent.

Finally, Francis reached the boarding area for a plane marked for London - and just in time! It seemed the passengers were lining up. Francis summed up all the nerve he had and cried out, "Arthur!"

The entire group turned to him, and not a single one of them was Arthur. They looked in shock at one another for a moment, Francis and the crowd, before he slunk away, their barely suppressed giggles and murmurs of confusion following him. That must have been the wrong flight; Arthur was perfectly punctual. He was probably boarding somewhere else right now, and Francis was missing him. Probably forever.

Heaving a sigh, Francis trudged onward, uncaring if security caught him now. He had made an effort, and now it had been wasted. He had been too late yet again. Francis glanced out one of the large windows to look out on the planes.

He caught his breath. There, approaching a ramp, ready to board the aircraft, was a familiar head of blonde hair.

Francis ran for the nearest exit.

...

Out on the tarp, the wind whipped Francis's hair and the roar of planes formed around his ears a barrier thick with sound. He squinted through his hair and the noise, spotted the blonde, and ran. With time to spare: boarding seemed to be paused for some reason or other, which two officials seemed to be discussing with a man now.

Francis grabbed his shoulders from behind. "Arthur!"

The other man turned to look at him, thoroughly surprised. "Francis? What on earth are you doing here?"

Francis grinned. "I wasn't going to say good bye. I thought I'd decided that. But then I realized I didn't really treat you properly the last time we met, when I made you cry."

Arthur's eyes were soft. "I'm glad you came, Francis."

Tears pricked his eyes. "I'm glad I came, too." He swallowed. "Please, Arthur, stay here. Be with me. I love you. I love you so much."

At these words, Arthur's expression began to falter, and Francis feared he might cry again. But these would be tears of joy, right?

"Francis, I can't."

"Of course you can!" he choked, gripping his former lover's shoulders tightly. "I love you! Please, Arthur, I can be whatever you need me to be!" He continued to speak louder and louder, drowning out Arthur's protests as thoughts spilled from his lips faster than he could process them. "Please, just - I'll get clean! I swear, this time I mean it! We'll start over! You - you just can't leave me again!"

Arthur put gentle hands on Francis's. "I need to go."

"No!"

"You know this has to happen."

"No, no, nothing is ever set in stone! I can pay you back for the ticket if you want!"

"Look at me." Arthur pronounced his words carefully. "Francis."

Francis whipped his head, striving to look anywhere but at the man in front of him. Taking in large gasps of air, he blinked through his tears at this final request. Arthur cupped his face in his hands.

"You need to forgive yourself."

Francis blinked harder, confusion setting in. "What?"

"You need-"

"Francis."

At the sound of a new, unwelcome voice, Francis squeezed his eyes shut. His face clenched with tears. "Go away, Alfred!"

The tall man sighed, shoving his hands into his pockets. "I can't do that yet."

Francis sniffled pathetically and opened his eyes. "Why are you here?"

Alfred gestured to Arthur and the plane. Francis squinted, feeling strange. He laughed nervously and clapped Arthur on the shoulders. "Arthur here is an adult, Alfred. I think he can board a plane all by himself."

Alfred's resulting stare unnerved Francis. It refused to leave his face for a very, very long time until Francis was forced to look away.

The bespectacled man's expression was somber. "What do you think you're holding onto?"

A fresh torrent of tears began to flow. "Me? What am I holding onto? I loved him longer! I knew him forever! You couldn't possibly understand! Arthur still loves me, too, I know he does because he slept with me even though he was with you, and-" Francis fisted his eyes with one hand, screwing them shut, while still clutching Arthur with his other. "It's just so unfair!"

Suddenly, Francis noticed that the texture in his left hand was not flesh and cloth. Slowly, he opened his eyes, uncertain as to why it was that Arthur's shoulder was hurting his hand.

He was holding onto a crate. Weakly, he turned beseechingly to Alfred, who only stared back. In his eyes, there was something akin to pity.

It all came crashing down on Francis then.

A door slamming in his face. A frustrated phone conversation. Gilbert and Antonio's careful words. Everyone's odd behavior was finally making sense. But then, what of the visit in the park? Had that only been a figment of his imagination? A dream?

No, that had happened, alright. Just not recently. It had happened what seemed to be a long time ago, before the door slammed, before the phone call, before, before, right before Arthur had died.

Arthur was dead. Francis looked at the crate in astonishment and realized that there was a coffin inside. And inside that, Arthur. The going away party had really been a wake, and Francis had lost all of his chances to say good bye.

With a loud cry of despair, Francis crumpled to the asphalt. Alfred saw that he now understood, and went to his side. He warily gave the okay-go to the airport officials, assuring them that it was fine and they could load the crate. Alfred hoisted Francis's arm over his shoulder and supported him, as though he was a cripple, all the way to his car.

...

Once upon a time, a man named Francis and a man named Arthur were having an affair.

Francis had always been very careful when it came to sex. Of course he would have had sex in the time between losing Arthur and finding him again; he wasn't about to go celebate, and after all, the search took years, with many upsets and pauses along the way. But in any case, Francis has always been very safe with sex. However, drugs, which were never clean in the first place, were another story. He could rarely remember what went on when he did them, anyway.

And then Alfred walked in on the affair when it was going rather heatedly. And then he quietly walked out.

All their lives, Arthur had been tough. He had put up with a surly stepfather's abuse unflinchingly and still had the strength (or perhaps the gall) to order their friends around. And for as little as Francis knew him, Alfred had seemed a very mellow and forgiving person. He hadn't taken Arthur addictions to heart, after all.

As it was, these simple rules became irrelevant in the week that followed Alfred's discovery of their affair. Francis witnessed it in part because Arthur was forced to stay with him, which meant that for the first few days Alfred would come over and the fight would take place in Francis's living room.

Francis had never seen Arthur cry so easily and so much, and he had never guessed that Alfred could be so scary when he was angry. He had that sort of anger that was raw and reckless, and at one point it warranted Francis a bloody nose. (After that particular incident, he conceded to the fact that Alfred at least wasn't beating Arthur, and he never tried to defend him again. He wouldn't be able to anymore, anyway; Alfred stopped coming over after that, meaning Arthur would have to go to him to beg forgiveness, which he did.)

Meanwhile, unnoticed, Arthur was developing a cold. He began to sniffle even when he wasn't crying. He began to run a stubborn fever, which tended to come and go as it pleased. He started to cough. It came to be that one day, while over at Alfred's and feebly trying to argue, Arthur's coughing suddenly couldn't stop. He kept coughing, choked, and then hacked up blood on the living room carpet.

Needless to say, carpet ruined or not, feuding or not, Alfred rushed him to the hospital.

Sometime after Arthur was diagnosed with a special kind of pneumonia, the doctor sat down with Alfred and Arthur to talk about why Arthur wasn't getting any better if this was just a common fungul infection.

"I used to do heroin," Arthur said. Alfred's grip on his hand tightened. "That can cause respiratory problems and even pneumonia, can't it?"

The doctor shook her head. "Not this kind, although it has certainly exacerbated the problem."

PCP was especially common to victims of cancer and the AIDs virus, the doctor told them. With a cautious glance at Arthur and Alfred's intertwined fingers, she suggested that the men get tested for the latter right away, and that they should alert any other recent partners of the situation. Begrudgingly, Alfred called Francis.

Soon after, the hospital sent Arthur home to die, and he met Francis in the park the day after. Arthur had lost a lot of weight by then. He and Alfred were living together again. Francis decided, without a fuss, to leave them alone. He made himself disappear.

He learned Arthur was dead while reading obituaries. He had gotten into the habit because of his junky friends, and that morning, he was acting on mere habit. Then there was Arthur's name, in black and white. The sight of it was like a pair of hands clenched around his neck, shaking him awake.

Francis would have successfully killed himself after that, had Alfred not felt he had a duty to deliver him the news of Arthur's death in person. Francis got his stomach pumped, but it barely did any good, because he drowned his sorrows the way he had for years upon exiting the hospital.

He had been coming out of a bad trip when he found the results for his AIDs test on his counter and mistook them for being new. Mind addled, he set out to tell Arthur, forgetting the events that had transpired.

And so it went.


	2. The Life

**Chapter Two  
**  
Once upon a time, a junky named Arthur hated a perfect boy named Alfred.

It was their senior year at the local community college, and they shared a debate class. And a children's psyche course. And Introduction to Film Studies. Sourly, Arthur thought to himself that Alfred must either be an idiot or irresponsible, given his menagerie of classes. (Arthur took the same ones, but he thought of in the way that all people sometimes do that he was somehow better than everybody else, even when they did the exact same.)

Whatever it was with Alfred, it annoyed Arthur to the extent of driving him to excessively notice the other young man. Notice, not stalk.

Alfred had a wide circle of friends. Every Thursday and Sunday, he volunteered at a local soup kitchen. Wednesday was set aside for the local animal shelter and a neighborhood (American) football team. He dutifully attended any parties, mixers, or sporting events to which he was invited, granted that it didn't clash with his philanthropy. He kept his schedule busy and full to the brim with all the sorts of activities a model human being should be proud to perform. Alfred loved his country and everyone loved him.

All of this made Arthur hate Alfred even more.

...

That didn't stop him from following Alfred, though. And one day, when Arthur was particularly bored, he pulled out a smoke, and his mind began to wander. And, as he often did when his mind wandered, Arthur began to physically wander, without even worrying about being seen.

Then there was a hand on his shoulder, and he was caught. Though to be fair, Alfred didn't usually leave the soup kitchen until ten minutes later.

Alfred smiled. Arthur had to resist the urge to find him charming. "Hey - aren't you in my class?"

Arthur shrugged his shoulder, trying to get rid of Alfred's hand. "I suppose your face is familiar." He wasn't flattered. Not at all. So Alfred had recognized him - they had classes together. Big deal.

Alfred let his hand fall away momentarily; it hovered, and then rested on Arthur's back. "Would you like to have lunch with me?" He gestured toward some nondescript street. "There's a burger joint I really love down here."

I know that, Arthur thought. It was one of the many pieces of valuable information on Alfred he had gleamed so far. "I don't have any money with me."

Alfred laughed, a carefree sound so pleasing to hear that Arthur wished he could bottle it and keep it, for his ears only. "Don't worry, man, it's my treat."

Always the hero. Arthur tried to hate him, but found his heart weightlessly reflecting his true feelings as he replied, "Sure. I could use a bite."

...

This was actually not the first time that Alfred noticed Arthur. He had seen the other boy before around campus, recognizing him from class, and watched unseen on his way to wherever as Arthur smoked hand-rolled cigarettes, laughed at morbidly ironic jokes, and popped pills with a group of scraggly-looking guys. Although, that being said, Arthur wasn't looking so great himself: he was emaciated, his skin yellowed, and there were circles as dark as charcoal under his eyes. He appeared as though he didn't ever eat or sleep the amount he should, instead substituting key ingredients of a healthy diet with various illegal substances.

In reality, Alfred had been the one to start watching Arthur before Arthur had ever noticed him. He hadn't seen Arthur following him, and on the day he saw him outside the soup kitchen, Alfred assumed that things had gotten so bad for Arthur that he had decided to come around for a meal, only to become embarrassed when he saw his classmate, Alfred, inside.

From that moment on, Alfred was firmly convinced that Arthur needed saving. Meaning Arthur was more correct than he realized. Alfred was ever the hero.

...

Arthur pushed away the hand that was offering him a pill. "I don't have time. I've got to get to class soon."

Francis scowled, tightening his arm around the smaller man as they lay in the grass. "You're not really aiming to be anything, so I don't see why you bother."

With his cheek and one hand against Francis's chest, Arthur felt the beating of the other man's heart. "I like them. All that knowledge could be useful someday. The real question is why _you_ come here if you aren't even going to learn, you berk.

Francis didn't answer right away. Along the hill upon which they lay, the bodies of their equally drug-addled friends in the Liberal Arts department were strewn. Below them was a steeper incline, then a fence, and then the street. Above them, where they had to crane their necks to see, were the feet of other students and of professors as they head to class.

Arthur lifted his head and frowned at Francis. "Did you hear me?"

It occurred to him that Francis might not have, that he might be too high to notice. Acid affected the two of them differently: Francis had way more flashbacks. It was hard for him at times to comprehend or be coherent when his sense of reality was so distorted. Arthur all but gave up on receiving an answer, figuring it was a mostly rhetorical question anyway.

Francis wet his lips. "I came for you, really."

This gave Arthur a jolt. He fisted Francis's shirt, burying his face into his chest. "Don't be such a twat!"

Francis laughed, likely thinking himself romantic and Arthur bashful. But they weren't. There was a time when Arthur had yearned for Francis to say those sorts of things, yet right now, he realized with remorse how little the comment had affected him. He didn't want to be here anymore. He didn't want to be with Francis.

He thought of class. "I'm late."

"Keep the baby," someone nearby keened. They groggily rolled over towards where Arthur's voice had come from. "Give it away if you have to, but don't kill it."

"Not that sort of late," Arthur said dryly, but Francis was laughing too loudly for him to be heard. With a sinking feeling, Arthur felt that the company he kept wasn't what he wanted for himself anymore. He wasn't sure if there was a time when it ever was.

...

Meanwhile, he had begun to spend more and more time with Alfred. They sat beside each other in class and went out to lunch nearly every day. Arthur found the company refreshing; even if Alfred wasn't the brightest bulb in the box, he was still a step above the burn-outs he usually hung around. And despite his... dense exterior, Alfred actually shared some interests with Arthur, among those being the classes they took.

"By the way," Arthur began, the thought of Alfred's eccentric schedule on his mind, "What made you pick the classes you're taking, anyway?"

The other blonde crinkled his nose, halting the journey his coffee cup had been making to his lips. "What do you mean? Are they weird or something?"

"Yes, actually."

He chuckled. "Well, you're enrolled in half the same stuff. Why are _you_ taking them?"

Arthur scowled. "I asked you first."

Alfred sighed, tapping the frame of his glasses. "Oh, you're right; I guess you did. Well." He leaned towards a bit, one elbow on the table. "I suppose I just wanted to."

"But what about your major?"

"Oh, I have my degree," Alfred breezed. "Several, actually. I just decided to take some stuff on the side, because I'm interested in it."

Stunned, Arthur noted what a waste of money this was, even at a community college like they went to. Speaking of which... "What exactly did you get your degree in?"

Alfred smiled. "Heh, um, I'm in medicine. In fact, I just finished my residency, but I decided to take some time off, to enjoy time while I have it. It's a very time-consuming profession."

Arthur stared at him, dumbfounded. "And yet you willingly went into it anyway, knowing that?" He pursed his mouth shut, considering, and then opened it. "_Can_ you just take a year off like that?"

Alfred's smile was mysterious as he brought his coffee to his lips and sipped. "They're holding my job for me. Doctors are always in demand, after all."

Arthur shook his head as though to clear it. That didn't seem right. Unethical, even. And didn't all this mean Alfred was older than him? _Significantly_ older than him?

Arthur rubbed his temples. This was too much to take in all at once. He decided to change the subject. "So, what, eh, what kind of medicine are you in?"

"Surgery."

"Any particular kind...?"

The corners of Alfred's eyes crinkled in amusement. "Plastic."

Arthur scowled at him, confusion forgotten as a new wave of opinions hit him. "Oh. And what exactly attracted you to _that _field,?" he asked, thinking he already knew the answer.

"Oh, you know. To repair hare lips and perform facial reconstructions for burn victims and the like." He smiled at Arthur's blush; he was embarrassed for having assumed things. Alfred would know: he'd encountered this before. Still, he decided to shorten Arthur's misery. "Enough about me. I think I asked you the same question: why do you take the classes you take?"

Face turned downwards, Arthur searched his cup of lukewarm tea for his reflection, feeling his face still burning from his mistake. The world looked back at him in monochrome, he and Alfred looking like a pair in a dated photograph. Things no longer felt so natural for Arthur, though; in the face of Alfred's story, he felt like a genuinely lesser person. What was he even doing here?

Alfred was still looking at him as if he was expected to answer, and so Arthur complied, digging up his usual explanation. "I just like to know things. I'm like you, in that respect; my education is for recreational purposes. The difference between us, though, is that I can't really afford to, since I don't have a degree already. I likely never will. It seems like a waste to me." He thought about going on, but stopped, fearful of letting something about him slip that he rather wouldn't.

Alfred looked disappointed. "Why is it a waste?"

Because I can't settle for a menial job. Because only a menial employer would settle for hiring a junky. Because I'm going to die before I turn thirty anyway, and I don't want to settle into a career and a life only to have it taken from me. These were the things that Arthur wanted to say, but didn't. It would all be too melodramatic, and he had resigned himself to this fate a long time ago.

Instead, he answered, "It's who I am," and shrugged. It was as equally true as the other statements, at least.

Alfred worried his bottom lip between his teeth. An expression of indecision stole his features for a moment. "Arthur, what is it that you do with those guys you're always hanging out with?"

Arthur frowned, puzzled. Wasn't it obvious? "What are you asking that for?"

One long pause later and Alfred had managed to steel the courage needed to take the plunge. "Arthur, I know a rehab center. I was thinking you could get clean."

Alfred's words seemed to echo in his ears, becoming a cacophony as they repeated themselves over and over again in his mind. Meanwhile, unaffected by this din, Alfred went on. "I've been thinking about it for a long time, Art, and I just now had a feeling that getting clean could be good for you. That way, you can focus some time later on on getting a real degree in something. You got your whole life ahead of you, and what you said a couple seconds ago, it made me sad. I don't want your life to go to waste."

Arthur let out a loud, long breath. "I don't think it's a waste. I like the way I am." So even Alfred didn't get it. No one seemed to understand that he just wanted to... He just wanted to...

What was it that Arthur wanted to do, again? Had he ever had real reasons, rather than excuses, to do what he did? While he was lost in his thoughts, Alfred took both of his hands in his grip. His large fingers cradled Arthur's smaller, more slender ones. Arthur liked the way they fit together, with Alfred's on the top, shielding, protecting, like he always did. He couldn't blame Alfred for wanting to fix him.

"Please," Alfred begged, and his cloudless, sunny-day-sky-colored eyes beseeched Arthur. He couldn't say no to that.

"I'll think about it," Arthur said, finally. The way Alfred beamed, it was as though he'd just told him yes.

...

The light in Antonio's basement was still fizzling out from the last time, when Arthur and Lovino had bugged him to replace it. The green-eyed Spaniard had promised he would, but only after they tried what he had with him this time. A week later and he still hadn't. Watching as the flickering bulb swung lazily on its chain, Arthur wondered how he had let himself get back here.

Denial was useless, Arthur knew. He had been stepping out of the cafe in which he and Alfred had been having lunch, and he had run into Francis. Francis had said that he was going to Antonio's later. No question; he then took Arthur's hand, steering him towards another frequent haunt. Regardless of a lack of a question or no, Arthur had let him. If he hadn't want to come, he would've told Francis. Instead, he had voluntarily chosen to be here.

"I was thinking," Gilbert said, eyes flitting around the circle of people, "that we would try some new this time. New for you guys, anyway. I had some of this stuff yesterday and it was so fucking good, I just had to share it."

He pulled out the necessary items. Through the darkness, squinting, Arthur saw a glint of metal. Lovino seemed to catch sight of the needle at the same time and let out a frustrated groan.

"_Ugh_ - are you fucking _serious_, Gil? You can't get high off fucking _heroin!_"

The albino man scowled. "Who invited you, anyway?" Antonio seemed to take this question seriously and began to raise his hand, before having it slapped down by Lovino.

"He has a point," Arthur said dryly. "The point of it is to take away feeling, isn't it?"

"Not quite," Antonio piped up. "Just the bad feelings. It's so _great._ It's like, you don't care about _anything_."

"Sounds swell," Lovino said sarcastically.

Francis shrugged, causing the arm that he had lazily (possessively) draped over Arthur's shoulders to lift, lightly jostling him. "Hell, I'll bite."

Gilbert, in the midst of tying a rubber band around his arm, grinned. He spoke through his teeth, the band clenched between them. "Great. Who wants to take the first hit, after me?"

Arthur found his wrist being grabbed and raised into the air. "Arthur will."

"Francis!" he hissed. But it was too late; Gilbert had fixed him with that judgmental look. Reluctantly, Arthur grumbled his compliance, and the albino man smiled back before shooting up.

The group watched. Even Lovino had unconsciously leaned in a little, unsure of what would happen. Gilbert seemed unchanged, and then suddenly, the hand poised on the needle and the arm outstretched became almost limp. His usually lively red eyes went blank, and his entire physicality changed, as though a stone wall had gone down inside him.

Without much fanfare, he yanked out the needle and handed it to Arthur, along with a gum band of his own to use. Gilbert attempted to smile, the result airy and chilling.

Arthur took the objects from him with a swallow. Carefully, the rest of the room (meaning three people, minus Gilbert) watched him, wondering if he would go through with it. And if he did, would his reaction be just as disappointing?

Using his teeth as Gilbert had, and while still holding onto the needle, Arthur tied off the rubber band, watching as the veins in his forearm bulged. After a moment of hesitation, the eyes of the others got to him, and he quickly injected the poison into his veins.

"_Oh!_" he gasped, feeling - or rather, ceasing to - as his every trouble seemed to be sucked away. No more shame over the wounds his stepfather had inflicted on him as a child, no more spiral of fear for where his life was headed, and no more guilt over Alfred, who he had only just left behind with a false sense of security. There were only memories, which he could now flatly examine as an outsider. Or not; they no longer had the power they once did to force their way into the forefront of his mind. They were nothing to him now. Mere trifles.

With a contented sigh (which, unbeknownst to him, succeeded as his first gasp had in sending a jolt to Francis's - and Antonio's, Lovino darkly noted - groin) Arthur fell into Francis's embrace, letting the needle and band be pried away from him. His eventful reaction, unlike Gilbert's, had convinced even Lovino to try, and the remaining three who were yet to take the drug fell into a scramble for the supplies.

Arthur watched, detached. Finally, he had found what he had been looking for in these experiments with the illicit for so very long: a surefire escape from being him.

...

Arthur woke up with tears in his eyes, craving the comfort of emptiness.

"Really?" Francis had frowned when Arthur enthusiastically praised the drug's effects and described an urge for more. "I didn't really like it. I thought it was boring."

"Boring _how?_"

Francis shrugged. "I've had better highs."

Arthur tried not to be too disappointed. Of course Francis wouldn't understand, he reminded himself. Francis, unlike Arthur, was into drugs recreationally. He wasn't trying to hide from anything, so of course heroin would serve little purpose for him.

Still, the two went back and did it again, because new things were hard to come by these days, and Arthur kept begging him to.

Their group sat comfortably together, riding along on their bliss, not really saying much. Francis had to admit that the drug wasn't _too_ bad; he felt really relaxed. He leaned into Arthur a bit, lips brushing the face that had burrowed its way into his shoulder.

Soon, the atmosphere took a turn. Lovino, high wearing off and growing slightly bored, demanded that Antonio and everyone else make conversation. After some begrudging "why don't_ you?_" comments, Gilbert decided on a topic.

"I know something awesome we can talk about," he started, grin wolfish. "How did you lose your virginity, Lovino?"

He sputtered. "That's none of your damn business! Ask someone else!"

Gilbert pouted. "But I already know about Francis and Antonio. I was _there._"

Lovino scowled. "Then what about Arthur?"

They glanced at him curiously, Francis included. Arthur didn't talk about his personal life much, and for all of Francis's prompting, he had never gotten to learn the story behind that.

Arthur looked back at the expectant group with a flat expression. "Do I have to?"

Gilbert shrugged. "We're all friends here. Plus it'd be nice, since we all know _Lovino_ won't."

The Italian shot him a look, to which Gilbert childishly stuck out his tongue. Arthur shrugged in a somewhat indifferent manner, unsettling himself from Francis's side and sitting upright. "I suppose if I must..."

He thought for a moment, eyes flicking to the ceiling to his right. He chuckled softly. "It's not that interesting. I lost it to a friend of my stepdad's, of all people."

A few of the others began to chuckle along with him. "Aw, man - I bet he came on to you first," Gilbert snickered. "So, you humored him, right? To get him off your back?"

Arthur's smile faded, stretching into something of a grimace instead. "Something like that." His mouth turned downwards at the corners. "Come to think, I didn't like him much at all..."

The chuckling subsided. Suddenly, something was wrong with Arthur's demeanor. He seemed almost... distressed.

Despite this, however, he went on, suddenly laughing again. "I mean... yeah, he was so bothersome... I just wanted him to leave me alone. But you know, he kept telling me I was ugly. _Ugly!_ Well, if I was so ugly, why'd he want to fuck me, anyway?" Arthur was laughing pretty hard now, voice trembling with the effort to talk. Meanwhile, everyone else was deathly silent.

And then Arthur began to cry. "He kept telling me he was doing me a favor. That no woman was ever going to want me, so I might as well get used to that sort of thing. I tried to tell him no, but he was drunk, and he just kept..."

Francis wasn't sure what he should do. Would Arthur want him touching him? His fingers began to creep, attempting to touch a shoulder, but then hesitated and dropped. He traded an anxious look with Gilbert. Regardless, something would have to be done soon to escape this awkward situation. None of them were prepared to deal with this sort of emotion. He tried to catch Antonio's gaze, too, but the other man avoided it.

Arthur was the one to break the spell, reaching his hand out to Gilbert as he fisted his eyes. "God, I need... It's just that the high's gone away. I need another hit."

Wordlessly, Gilbert complied, and after a single press of the needle Arthur was fine within seconds. He wiped his eyes clear and laughed. And everyone else laughed, too, proving that this was their little secret. Sometimes, emotions let slip. This wasn't the first or the last time this would happen, and like all the other times, it would never be mentioned again.

...

Arthur and Francis went back frequently, skipping classes in the process. Arthur didn't protest; getting high was the only thing that mattered to him anymore. The few times he appeared on campus, Alfred tried to run him down, only to find that the words coming out of Arthur's mouth had ceased to make sense. Still, he tried his hardest to steer Arthur towards class. And when he couldn't get him to move, he told Arthur, stay here, please, I'll be with you right after class... only to find upon looking over his shoulder seconds later that he had disappeared. For all his efforts to reach out, Arthur eventually stopped showing up at all, leaving Alfred with no way to contact him.

And so Francis and Arthur continued to sit in the dark in Antonio's basement until they were practically residents. Francis's parents cut him off, forcing him and Arthur to unofficially drop out of college - not that they went anymore - and move in. Like Lovino, they began waiting for Antonio and Gilbert to get home from their jobs to provide them with money so that they could get high together and maybe eat.

Eventually it was just Gilbert and Arthur shooting up, the others having lost interest, perfectly content with regular old acid. But even Gilbert got bored, and Arthur had to seek a new source. He found it in back alleys and in buildings which lacked windows and had long since been abandoned. He paid by any method he could.

Most days, Arthur woke up not just in tears, but in gut-wrenching sobs that shook his whole frame. Every time he came down from his high, he felt worse. His despair seemed to him to be a bottomless pit, one he couldn't claw his way out of.

In the end, he went crawling, on his hands and knees, to a place that was warm and smelled of stale bread and canned goods. Needless to say, Alfred was shocked, one month after Arthur disappeared, to find his classmate curled up on the soup kitchen's doorstep.

...

It was the first time since his childhood that Arthur had woken up in a hospital. He tried to move his head and found something laying on his neck. He brought up his hand to feel the something, and found his fingers entwined in soft, blonde grass.

"You're awake," Alfred said. His lips tickled Arthur's collarbone, which was exposed through his ill-fitting hospital gown. He wondered how the children and malnourished anorexia patients were supposed to fit properly into these things.

Arthur moved his hand slowly along Alfred's head, which had yet to move. Hair. Ear. Cheek. He pushed on it, made Alfred look at him.

The sight of the other boy's face, red and streaked with stale tears, gave Arthur pause. Alfred began to cry again.

"I thought you were dead." No anger, no accusation. No scolding. Just concern, unfickle and unconditional.

"How long do I have to stay?" Arthur softly asked, because he could think of nothing else to say.

Alfred gave a soft chuckle, then palmed his swollen eyes. He sniffled. "Oh, I dunno, however long it takes for you to gain weight. Doctors said you were in the second percentile..." His lips trembled. "That's... _really_ bad, you know. What have you been eating?"

"Not very much," Arthur confessed. He laughed. "God, you're going to make _me_ cry!"

Alfred laughed right with him. "But you had me so _worried!_ I deserve to cry a lit-"

"I'm sorry. I should have listened to you."

The smile he received in return for his apology was refreshingly sincere. "If nobody made mistakes, we'd never learn anything."

Then Arthur did cry, because what Alfred had said was just so cliché and _silly._ With a chuckle, Alfred nervously scratched his head, admitting that he had heard that in a movie somewhere. But the thing was, he had meant it. Arthur recognized that this was Alfred not holding it against him, forgiving him, and that was something Arthur had wanted more than anything else.

Closing his arms around Alfred's neck, Arthur shut his eyes and breathed in. He kissed Alfred's ear, his jaw, and became pliant as Alfred fit their lips together. Their mouths seemed to align perfectly.

Arthur had never felt loved before. He let himself bask in it now, and he found that he liked it. So much, in fact, that he never wanted it to stop.

...

Once upon a time, a junky named Arthur hated a perfect boy named Alfred.

Long story short: he realized he didn't hate him, after all. And when they kissed, Arthur hardly remembered Francis's name.


	3. The AfterLife

**Chapter 3: The After-Life**

"I can't - believe - _Arthur!_"

Alfred kept his eyes trained on the highway ahead. "Me and Matt will drive down for your car tomorrow." He didn't trust Francis to drive himself in this state.

"What am I going to do?" Francis sobbed. ""I can't live without him!"

Beside him, Alfred listened to this tirade with grit teeth. "Francis. Come on."

"I looked for so fucking long, and for what? What? Fuck! Arthur's dead!"

"Francis."

"He didn't even... I didn't even say good bye right! I just made him cry, and..."

"_Francis._"

"What am I going to _do?"_

The car jerked violently as Alfred pulled off to the side of the road and stopped. Francis swore, rubbing him neck at the impact. "What the hell-"

"You," Alfred sneered. "What are _you_ gonna do. _You_ loved, _you _looked, you, you, you! _You_ aren't the only one who fucking lost him!"

He stopped screaming in Francis's face, expression suddenly very blank. Then, slowly, he settled back into his seat, his eyes fixed straight ahead. "I'm sorry."

Francis let out a breath he'd been unconsciously holding. "Don't mention it."

This answer seemed to piss Alfred off again. "Fuck you. Whoever you are. I'm still not sure."

Francis scowled. "What is _that_ supposed to mean?"

"Exactly what it sounds like," Alfred sputtered, frustrated. "I mean, who _are _you? Where did you come from? Why would Arthur... _cheat_ on me, with _you...?_"

"Wait a minute," Francis interrupted. His expression was slightly scandalized. "How much did Arthur tell you about me?"

Alfred shrugged. "That you're Francis Bonnefoy, an 'old friend', and 'I won't cheat on you ever again I _promise'._" He sighed, dropping the hand that had been erratically forming air quotes. "He said the same stuff over and over again, so at some point I just forgave him. And I never pried after he got sick. It seemed wrong to."

Francis's lip trembled. "But _you_ stole Arthur from _me! _At the university!"

Alfred looked at Francis with a strange sort of tired sadness. "Honestly, I don't remember seeing you ever until a month ago, when I... walked in on you two."

...

Alfred wasn't lying. In the entire time he had spent with Arthur at college, he had never noticed Francis enough to later remember him. Francis had been there, he supposed, but then, Alfred had never seen first-hand those darker sides of Arthur's life, and he had never inquired after them. If Arthur was so willing to run off with Alfred and leave his old life behind, then those other people couldn't have been very important.

Not only that, but he was afraid to pry, because Arthur had specifically said that he did not want to talk about it. He wanted to start anew, tabula rasa. The only people outside his old circle of friends who knew much about his life before Alfred were the members of his group therapy at rehab. And frankly, Arthur felt those were all the people he needed to tell to feel as though he had let it all off his chest.

That was how he had taken to categorizing his past: life before Alfred and life after. Alfred had at the time appreciated the sentiment, and only vaguely understood it, in the way that vague understanding sometimes comes with empathy.

Now, Alfred understood fully, and he began to sort his life in a similar way: life with Arthur, and life after his death.

...

After dropping Francis off at his apartment to mourn alone, Alfred was planning to drive straight home and dive right into work. He needed, in this sea of confusion, to cling to something that made sense. He would call his office and then the hospital and tell everyone he was ready to come back to work, right now if possible. Without pay, if he had to. He would work the ER, relieve his secretary and schedule all of his own appointments. Push some of them up. Whatever. Maybe if he made some people feel better about themselves, he could take on their happiness. Emotional osmosis.

Instead, however, when Alfred had asked for directions to his place, Francis had cried too hard for Alfred to understand him and then passed out in his car. Alfred had been to Francis's home before, but that had been a long time ago - or it seemed that way. In reality, Arthur had been alive only weeks ago. (And weeks before that, Alfred had been blissfully unaware of the affair, the disease boiling in his veins, and the existence of Francis Bonnefoy.)

In any case, Alfred had his reasons for not being able to get to Francis's apartment without help (supreme mental exhaustion among them) and he decided, reluctantly, to take Francis home with him. He figured that if the Frenchman didn't wake up from being violently shaken, he wouldn't wake up from being unceremoniously dumped on Alfred's living room couch, either. There was a moment where Francis's brow tensed in his sleep, and Alfred was terrified that he had been wrong and would soon be yet again berated by a hysterical Francis. But then his expression settled into solemnity. "Peaceful", Alfred figured, was not a word that would be able to describe either of their sleeping faces for a long time.

Alfred took a moment to stand in his living room, feeling the emptiness of the house around him, save for Bonnefoy on the couch. Looking at Francis now, without his pathetic sobs directly in his ear, Alfred felt a twinge (but very small) of pity for him. He had been in love with Arthur too, after all. They had that much in common.

After shutting off the kitchen lights, which he had left on since about six this morning, Alfred began feeling through the darkness for the staircase. He bumped his knees once or twice while maneuvering through the living room, swore colorfully, and then found the stairs just as his eyes began to adjust to the dark.

He rested one foot on the bottom step, then paused. The moonlight coming through the glass window on their front door illuminated some of the entry way. Alfred squinted, finding that everything about the decorating scheme - the dark wood, the crystal pattern on the front door's window, the green and yellow striped wallpaper - made him think of Arthur, who had chosen it all.

The dull ache that had been resting on Alfred's ribcage intensified, and laboriously, carrying leaden feet, he began to ascend the staircase.

But upstairs, things only got worse. If it had hurt sleeping in this room without Arthur back when he'd been hospitalized, then the pain caused Alfred to be here, alone, now, made him physically sick. His feet stumbled as they brought him to the bed, and he collapsed on it. There he curled up, tears leaking out of his eyes though he willed them to stop, fisting the sheets in his hands. He proceeded to stare at the wall, their closet, but more importantly, the empty side of the bed where Arthur used to lay. He didn't move, instead letting the silence fit around him like a glove, or a pair of warm and maternal arms. (These heavy pauses of reflection in his life were increasing in frequency. They could become a habit, he thought. He did not like this idea.)

Alfred continued to stare. He stared until his eyes were too dry to shed the tears that were pent up inside his chest. He stared until he heard the sound of his houseguest stirring downstairs and light began to spill from his window. He stared until, at last, his eyes were too tired to stare anymore, and he fell into a dreamless sleep.

...

When Alfred next opened his eyes, it took a moment for him to collect his thoughts. They came back to him in waves. At first, they were gentle crests; but then, as the tsunami that was Arthur's death crashed down around him, he felt flattened to his bed with more than just physical exhaustion. He was soaked, vulnerable, shivering. He wondered when it would hurt less. And _how_.

Glancing at the digital clock on Arthur's night stand, he swore and rolled over to grab the phone on his bedside table. He groggily punched in the numbers for his brother's home phone.

"Al? How are you feeling?"

Bless caller ID. It had already made this conversation much faster.

"Hey, Matt. Listen, I'm gonna need a favor from you."

Matthew paused, likely because Alfred hadn't answered his question, and he wasn't sure what that meant. "Sure, Al. Anything. What do you want?"

"I'm gonna need you to go to the airport with me."

There was a long silence on the other end. Then, his brother spoke in a low voice. "I thought... you took care of that yesterday."

Alfred realized what he was talking about and swallowed hard. "Damn, not - _that!_ I... I gotta pick up a car."

He could hear his brother sigh a heavy sigh of relief. "Oh. Okay. I thought I had that date right." Matthew seemed to remember that this was an odd request. He cleared his throat. "May I, uh, ask why?"

"Long story," Alfred grumbled. "I'll tell you when I pick you up. Be there in five."

"O-okay. But, um, before you hang up, Al, how _are_ you feeling?"

Alfred caught his breath to keep from tearing up. He channeled some of that sadness into anger as he snapped, "How do you _think?_" and not-so-gently jammed the phone back into its cradle.

Quickly, Alfred pulled off the clothes he had worn yesterday and replaced them with whatever his hands touched first out of his closet. (They hesitated on Arthur's clothes, then swept them aside, to the corners of the closet where he wouldn't have to see them) In the bathroom, he quickly brushed his teeth and ran his fingers through his hair, mussing it into place. He contemplated shaving, but then decided that it would take too long. The golden stubble was subtle, but it still made him look significantly older, or perhaps that was how hectic his life had been lately doing that. Either way it was a change, and Alfred found that he wanted to be as different a person as possible from who he had been yesterday.

Coming out of the bathroom, Alfred stopped to put his discarded clothes in the hamper (a habit pounded into him by Arthur) before making his way into the hall and down the steps. It wasn't until he was slipping on his shoes that he was reminded of his house guest.

"Leaving without breakfast?" The voice drifted lazily towards him like a waft of slow-spreading smoke. Typical Frenchman.

Alfred shot him a mere glance before he resumed looking at his feet. "I'm getting your car. Don't bother offering to come. You need the rest."

"Why?" Francis asked, lip curling. "Because of my grief, or because you think I'm such an... addict?"

"Both," Alfred confessed. After all, Francis's delusions could be easily connected to both, couldn't they?

"Fie on you," Francis sighed, sinking onto the living room couch. "I wouldn't have offered to come anyway. You owe me. Untrusting bastard that you are."

Alfred felt his temper flare. "First of all, I am not _untrusting_. I know for a fact you're an addict."

"Because I am Arthur's friend?" Francis sneered. "From his _old life?_"

"How about because I fucking saved you from OD'ing on that shit?" Alfred snarled. "Which brings me to my next point: _I _owe _you_ nothing. I fucking saved your life! Of course, you've probably conveniently forgotten that."

Francis paused. "I remember... bits and pieces..."

Alfred clenched his hand over the door knob. "Yeah, well, know this: I don't owe you shit. Why would you even think otherwise? I hardly know you."

"I _told_ you," Francis huffed. "You _stole_ Arthur from me!"

Jaw tense, Alfred turned away, pulling the door open. "Fuck you. I'll be back with your car in an hour."

...

"So he just broke down on the tarp?"

"Yeah, yeah. Poor bastard was probably high out of his mind. I _knew_ Arthur shouldn't have trusted that guy. First he fucking gives us AIDs, and now..." Alfred leaned over the steering wheel, tightening this grip. "And now, this just proves how fucked up he is."

Matthew sighed, about to speak when the car wrenched to a stop. He watched beside him as his brother flew into a rage at the driver who had cut him off. Matthew did not speak until after Alfred had slumped into his and released the break. Even then, he waited for the string of curses to die down.

He started with a preliminary compliment to help ease into the conversation. "That's very kind of you, to do something like that for him."

"Damn straight," Alfred grumbled. "Speaking of which, did I tell you what that guy had the nerve to say to me this morning?"

He relayed the words they had exchanged to his brother, who tried not to get too visibly nervous as Alfred got heated at the memory and began to raise his voice.

"And then I reminded him that if it weren't for me, he'd be dead! I mean-"

"Wait," Matthew cut in. "How?"

"What?"

"How, how would he be dead? I thought he was hallucinating."

"He was," Alfred explained. "But that's not what I was talking about. You see, a week ago, when Arthur, um, passed away..." He paused to swallow. "I decided to tell Francis myself, and I found him on the floor, unconscious. I figured he'd OD'ed - all the telltale signs were there, I mean,. empty pill bottles and scattered pills and everything."

"I didn't know that," Matthew said incredulously. "Why didn't you tell me before?"

"Because I was a little busy," Alfred grumbled. The two silenced at that, but not for long. Surprisingly, however, it wasn't the usually chatty sibling to break the silence.

"Still - what a thing to witness! And you _saved_ him? Wow. Just, wow. I'd have thought you'd be real excited about that and tell me right away."

"Yeah, well." Alfred glared at the road. "I'm kind of regretting it, now."

Matthew snorted. "You don't mean that."

"Maybe not. But maybe I do. He probably didn't want my help anyway," Alfred pointed out," if he was so ready to kill himself in the first place."

"I'm sure he's grateful, deep down."

"I'm not so sure," Alfred retorted. "He's not really made himself out to be much of a house guest yet, either."

...

Francis made a face of disgust as his peek into the fridge proved fruitless. And vegetable-less. And in general, truly tasteless. It didn't surprise him that Arthur had lived here not too long ago; there were some preserved bits of burnt food that looked as though they'd been concocted by a certain green-eyed blonde.

Growing sad at that thought, Francis shut the refrigerator door. Perhaps he could just eat some of the gelatins left behind by the mourners. There was an army of them lining the counters and taking over the kitchen table.

On second thought, he wasn't feeling too keen about a meal. He was still shaking off that lousy feeling of shame he'd gotten arguing Alfred this morning. He didn't know why he felt like that, though, since Alfred was a total bastard who deserved all of it. Except Arthur being dead, of course, since that affected Francis, too.

Emptiness. He'd cried himself out and now he felt thoroughly sucked dry. Well, no, not dry, exactly. It was hard to explain; all he could say was that he didn't feel right, and that it was more than a little awful that he wouldn't be seeing Arthur anymore. He wanted to leave, but he needed his car to get home. He wondered how far the park was from here.

Francis wandered into the living room. If he was left alone, he might as well do some snooping. This place was pretty nice looking. A little old fashioned - shades of Arthur - but anyway, Francis wasn't buying the whole "perfect, happy home" routine. No way. There was something wrong with these two and he was going to figure out what it was.

He started by rummaging through drawers in the living room. If there was any incriminating evidence to be found, it wouldn't be among the silverware. Francis found a lot of domestic and medical magazines, some brochures, and a snow globe. The brochures were for places like Mexico and Hawaii, the generic tropic getaways. Very un-Arthur, if anyone were to ask Francis.

_Of course, how well do you even know him anymore?_ a voice in the back of his head inquired. He tried to push those thoughts had slept with Francis even thought he'd been living with Alfred for years. Meaning that to some extent, Arthur had chosen _him._

But you can't say that for sure, and now it's too late to ask Arthur yourself.

Francis grit his teeth and swallowed. He swallowed and swallowed and tried not to think about anything. He breathed hard through his nose. What was up with that stupid snow globe, anyway?

He held it up to his face, concentrating on it, distracting himself. Slowly, he began to realize how odd the scene inside was: three boys were chasing each other up the steps of a slide, each at varying stages of approaching the chute. One was just grasping the bars of the ladder; one was at the top, overlooking the playground from where he gripped the rungs; and the third had begun the descent, his arms in the air, the close-lipped smile on his face giving him an air of knowing something no one else did. It seemed an almost unfitting expression for the scene, and Francis decided that it was bad painting on the artist's part.

Watching the flakes settle gently at the boys' feet, Francis wondered whose snow globe it was. Alfred's? Arthur's? Was it a souvenir someone had dumped on one or the other, or had they chosen it with utmost care? He stared, the storm inside it having long come to a halt.

The wry expression on the sliding boy's face made Francis remember something. It was about Arthur, from before.

It was one of the first days of their affair - literally, the second or the third. They had spent an entire afternoon in the throes of sex. Thinking back, Francis can't help but wonder about the details - did Arthur have a job? Why wasn't he there? What had he told Alfred? All these aspects hadn't even occurred to Francis then and there must be answers to each, but how could he know? Arthur rarely talked about his other relationship to Francis. In fact, that was one of the reasons this particular instance stood out.

They were lying side by side, feeling really peaceful because of the afterglow and all that. Their togetherness gave Francis a sort of nostalgia, especially after he looked his room over; he had the same messy habits he'd had since high school, so this room wasn't all that different from the one back then. For some reason, this comparison made Francis very sad. The good old days were such for a reason. Why did Arthur have to go and ruin that, running off like he had? Why?

"Why Alfred?" Francis asked the ceiling. Beside him, Arthur's breathing had become more deliberately paced.

"He showed me unconditional love."

Francis turned over onto his side. "That's not it."

Arthur shut his eyes. "Believe whatever you want," he said with a yawn. "It's hardly relevant now."

Lips pursed, Francis continued to stare hard at the other man's face. Silently, he was demanding he bend to his will. But Arthur wouldn't talk.

"What's the appeal, anyway?" Francis said finally. "I mean, I'm just as good looking."

Arthur's responding shrug stung. It wasn't of indifference to the content of the question, so much as a statement of _I don't feel like this right now._ Still, Francis plowed on, determined to make him talk. "What's he got that I don't, huh?"

"A _job_, for one. He doesn't live off favors people owe him."

Francis scowled. "Oh, yeah? And what's this job that's such a turn-on for you?"

There was a pause. "He's a plastic surgeon."

Whoa - big bucks. The thought of what all that money could buy made Francis dizzy. So did the education involved - maybe Alfred _wasn't _the dumb schmuck he thought he was. Still, Francis knew he had to say something biting or risk losing the fight. "So he spends all day cutting open breasts and women's fatty thighs, giving liposuction. No wonder he's gay."

"He's not in it for that," Arthur said defensively. "He's a very good person. He fixes harelips and things. Does skin grafts on burn victims. Charity work."

"Very touching," Francis replied dryly. "But _all _the time? You can't get by on charity work, dear."

Arthur hesitated again. "Well, no, not all the time. You're right, it wouldn't pay much. But that's not the point - even if the work seems selfish, his original motives are utterly selfless."

"Maybe he gets off on being thanked," Francis pointed out. "Or he's building up a sparkling resume."

Another pause. "You're wrong. He's not like that." But the words sounded hollow, recited. Francis had gotten him thinking, even if he didn't want to acknowledge it.

Arthur rolls onto his side, away from Francis. He says very softly what a good, hard-working person Alfred is, what a cynic Francis is, how jealous of Francis, and don't be such a nitwit. But he doesn't make a move to leave, meaning he wants to be here more than he feels hurt by what Francis has said. Meaning this whole ordeal, to Francis, is a victory.

Or not, he thinks now. In the present, that wry, mysterious look on Arthur's face means a thousand different things. Maybe he didn't want to leave because he wasn't expected home and had nowhere else to go. Maybe he wanted to stay around to fix Francis the way Alfred had so kindly fixed him. Maybe, maybe. So many maybes. There are just too many uncertainties in life, Francis thinks.

...

Naturally, Alfred was also thinking about Arthur. In the quiet of his own car, with his brother trailing behind in Francis's, he had lost the will to convey his anger, or to entertain it. Anger took up too much energy, the upside of this being that it sometimes exhausted him so much that he couldn't bring himself to think.

Right now, though, he wanted to think. He decided to focus on nice memories: their journey to Niagara Falls with Matt and his former fiancé; watching Arthur's face erupt into a smile when he (dishonestly) commended him on a delicious meal, after Arthur had had a particularly bad day; sleeping beside Arthur, watching him sleep, waking up and finding that Arthur liked to watch him, too...

With a small, crooked smile, Alfred adjusted his rearview mirror and caught sight of his brother on the phone in the car behind him . Alfred's expression unhinged slightly; hopefully, the call had nothing to do with him. He had already told Matthew that he didn't want their mother barging in on his life until he was ready.

_"What do you mean, ready?" Matthew frowns. "She only wants to comfort you."_

"You know it wouldn't turn out that way," Alfred replies drearily. To this day, he couldn't understand how his brother put so much faith in their mother.

"At least try._"_

"I can't_, Matt," Alfred keens. "She'll just turn it all back to her. I don't have the energy for that. Not yet. But I will soon, I promise."_

"Okay," his brother gives in, pouting. "But I still think you're being a little silly. No one's asking you to suck it up and be the hero, Al. Mom's going to let you mourn - you deserve_ to mourn."_

Still, staring out at the highway and the sea of cars stretching before him, Alfred dreaded the day she would eventually arrive. His mother's current husband, using his age as an excuse not to travel, would stay home, happy to have the house to himself without his wife around. Alfred's mother would cry for him, but eventually she would bug him to move on and visit her more often. Then the past would be brought up, his mother berating his choices, until Alfred finally snapped and she fled for home, trailing crocodile tears to make him feel guilty. No, he couldn't do that yet. He wanted a distraction from Arthur's death - just not _that _kind. He wanted desperately to be happy again, free from this miserable cage that trapped him. But so far, he could see no way out.

And he still had Francis to deal with.

_"It's a wonder that you can care about everyone without stretching yourself thin."_

Traffic at a stand-still, Alfred allowed himself the luxury of shutting his eyes and picturing that memory.

_They are on the phone together. Alfred is at the office from which he ran his private practice, and Arthur is at home. The local hospital is requesting Alfred's help for an emergency skin graft and he won't be getting home for another several hours. He won't be paid for it, either, and thus Arthur had made his comment._

"They need me," Alfred replies huffily. "I'm not stretching myself thin."

"I didn't say you were," Arthur says. His voice is disappointed. "I said that it's a wonder you haven't yet. Meaning you still can, so be careful."

"I can't just ignore this," Alfred says with finality. "I'm going. Don't bother making dinner for two."

"Fine, go, go. What a shame. Since you won't be bringing home any compensation for your heroic efforts, I was supposing I'd just have to be the one to reward you. But now that you're in such a mood..."

Alfred's ears perked up. "What? Bad mood? Who's in a mood? You know I love you, more than anybody else in the world?"

Arthur chuckled. "Goodbye, Alfred."

There had been complications, though. They couldn't get the patient sedated enough and kept having to halt procedures to treat her pain. In the end, Alfred came home hours later than he had said he would. He found Arthur asleep in the living room wearing nothing but a robe. Sunlight streaming through his eyelids, Alfred pictured him at that moment, pretending that he wasn't in his car but back then, at a time far, far away.

_Summoning up what little strength the day has left him, Alfred hoists Arthur into his arms bridal-style and carries him to their room. He lays him down on the bed and gets to work preparing for sleep, brushing his teeth while he strips off articles of work clothing._

When he gets back to bed, Arthur hasn't budged. Alfred is under the impression that he is still asleep, but as he is slipping under the covers beside him, Arthur speaks.

"I said it would happen, didn't I?"

"Ha?" Alfred grunts, shifting where he lays. "Said what would happen?"

"Good night, Alfred."

Someone honked at him. Alfred's eyes flew open and he began to shift the car back into drive, flustered as a cacophony of horns followed the first. "I'm fucking going," he hissed to himself, feeling anger like a red hot iron piercing his skull. Why had Arthur been so mad at him, anyway? He had just been doing his job.

_"Dammit, Alfred! Did it ever occur to you that when you wear yourself down, you're wearing _me_ down?"_

Oh, that. Right.

_"Other people don't matter to me! I care about _you_!"_

He'd stopped a majority of his charity surgeries then, under the impression that the local hospital wanted not his skill but the fact that they could get away with not paying him. He got fewer calls from burn victims and more from women who wanted breast enhancements. For the first time in his life, Alfred became successful instead of selfless, and that made him feel guilty. He could go back to the way things had been, but he feared Arthur's reaction, and so remained miserable... and began to blame Arthur.

_Is that why he cheated on me?_

Alfred felt even more tired than ever. Apparently, a myriad of emotions could do that even better than anger alone could.

...

Alfred left Matthew outside, thinking that since his brother was already in his own car anyway, he might as well drive home now. However, he wouldn't be surprised to look out a window and still find him in the driveway. Matt was obstinate that Alfred needed to be babied, and in the presence of copious amounts of human company, in his current state of mourning. He had begged to be let in, but Alfred had refused. He really needed to be alone, and as soon as he got rid of Francis, he could achieve that.

However, Alfred's house guest was not in the living room where he had left him. Frowning, Alfred wandered into the kitchen, hoping for the other man's sake that he was still somewhere downstairs.

A mere glance into the room proved he was not there. Still, Alfred compulsively stepped inside to make sure, though he already had a feeling he knew where Francis had gone. He slowly paced the kitchen, looking for warmth, a mess, or some sort of proof that Francis had perhaps had breakfast and, in the process, helped rid Alfred of some of the excess food he had been receiving since the obituaries had been posted. Absent-mindedly sliding it along the counter, Alfred's hand smacked into a bottle, knocking it over and producing a plastic, maraca-like sound.

Released from his reveries by the din, Alfred made eye contact with the label of his prescription bottle. One does twice a day, and he'd get to live to see another. Alfred realized with little fanfare that he hadn't taken any for a few days, what with the funeral and now Francis to take care of. He wondered whether or not to pick it up now.

_Of course you should, idiot,_ a voice in the back of his mind scoffed. _You want to live, don't you?_

Francis entered the room then. Alfred could hear how his footsteps went from a normal pace to one of caution.

"Were you upstairs?" Alfred asked. If Francis were to say no, even if Alfred heard the lie in his voice, he would have let him go. Honestly, right now, he didn't want to fight. Not with Francis so close to leaving for good.

"Yeah. Is that a problem?" The sneer in his statement nearly set Alfred off, but he controlled himself. He gripped his hands onto the counter's edge tighter and kept not looking at Francis. He said, "Yeah, that is. But you didn't know, so it's okay."

"It's okay because this is Arthur's house, too." Alfred turned around, nearly panicking. Was Francis losing it again? The other man was glaring at him. "Arthur would have no problem with my being here. I bet that pisses you off."

Everything went red. Alfred grit his teeth and began to count. "I got your damn car. Go the fuck home." One, two, three...

"Make me," Francis challenged. Four...

"Dammit, I'm trying to help you!" Five, six...

"I don't want your help!" Francis hollered. "Fat help you were to Arthur!"

_Ten._

Alfred lunged at him and the two went toppling onto the ground. Francis was no pushover; he fought back, and he fought back _hard_. In fact, his life experiences had made him a better fighter than Alfred. However, the other man was stronger and pinned him quickly. Francis's life had made him strong, but his life_style_ had also made him regrettably thin. He thrashed beneath Alfred, but to no avail.

"Don't you blame me!" Alfred screamed into his face. "I took care of him! _You_ killed him!"

Francis struggled. Alfred couldn't tell if the agony on his face was from their physical fight or the verbal one. "If that's - ng! - what you believe, fine. At least I get to kill you in the process!"

"That doesn't matter!" Alfred cried, tears of anger stinging his eyes as his hands curled around Francis's throat. "Arthur's still dead!"

Alfred squeezed his eyes shut for only a moment, his tears having blurred his vision. But that moment was all it took: Francis punched him in the face and threw him off, Alfred's glasses clattering to the floor in the process. Bewildered, he reached for them, only to find Francis's weight pressing down on his chest. His forearms were being ground into the tile by Francis's vice-like grip, and he hissed in pain, squirming. "Get off1"

They struggled together a few moments more until they were panting at the effort. Inside them both, the anger had quelled, replaced instead with exhaustion and the dull ache of sadness. Alfred said, "Do you really want to stay that badly?"

"No." Francis set his nemesis free, rolling onto the floor beside him so he could catch his breath. "I just, I just wanted to see where Arthur lived. What was so grand about it that he was so unwilling to leave it."

Alfred turned his head so as to look Francis in the eye, to offer him some words of comfort. The words became caught in his throat, finding that the other man had rested on his side, his back to Alfred. He was hugging his shoulders close to himself.

Sitting up, Alfred said softly, "Hey. You can stay a little longer if you want. If it gives you closure, look around." Then, remembering, "I brought your car back, so you can leave whenever you're ready. Don't feel obligated to go so soon, though."

Still not looking at the other man, Francis kept his gaze trained beneath one of the kitchen counters. Alfred could see that his eyes weren't really seeing anything they touched on.

Francis spoke, frankly. "I'll never get closure." There was a pregnant pause, then, "I'm not ready..." He trailed off, then tried again. "I don't like..." he bit his tongue before he could say "you", then cursed, dragging himself to sit up. "You don't really want me here."

"That's not true," Alfred said, surprised at how honest it felt. He was suddenly embarrassed by his statement. He was supposed to hate Francis, yet by nature Alfred was unable to hate anyone in such a helpless state. He remembered Francis telling him he didn't need to be helped and decided to make up another reason. "I don't want to be alone right now."

"Then spend the night with your friends, your family. People you enjoy being with."

He shook his head. "They'd just smother me. These past few days, every time they gather, I feel so claustrophobic. It's like their pity makes the room smaller. I don't want them all looking at me like that. I want things to be normal again."

Those were the sorts of thoughts he had used to confess to Arthur. He alone was privy to them, and now, having said them aloud after keeping them bottled up for mere days, Alfred was relieved. Francis, on the other hand, didn't know quite how to take any of it.

An idea came to him suddenly. "Francis, would you talk to me about him?"

The other man blinked, once, twice, and looked at him incredulously. "What do you mean? Arthur?" He frowned at Alfred's pleading look. "Don't you already know enough?"

"No," Alfred said honestly. "There were some parts of his life he never shared with me, that I'm sure you were a part of. Could you please tell me about them? Please?"

Francis was looking at him warily and feeling as though Alfred was asking him for something that was precious and exclusively his. Alfred continued to plead. "Please? I never got to hear it from him. I would have loved to, but now I can't ever. Please, this is all I have."

Francis chuckled softly. "'Please', you say. 'All' you have. You have all _this._" Francis gestured around him, implying the house and all within. Arthur was in the wallpaper, the air, the very shape of every object. This fact was glaringly obvious. "Those memories, on the other hand, are all _mine_. All _I _have."

"I can share mine with you, too," Alfred replied, determined. "I can even give you physical things of his. 'Cause looking at all this -" again, a gesture, "- just makes me sad."

Alfred realized he must sound like a raving lunatic, but honestly, if straws were all he had to grasp at, then by God he would grasp at straws. He figured that what he was offering Francis had to be worth as much to him as what his memories would mean to Alfred.

Francis stared at the ground. "I don't like you."

"I don't like you either," Alfred quickly replied. The other man fixed him with a poker face, studying him, his sincerity.

"Fine," said Francis. "Let's meet someplace green."

...

Several hours later, Alfred was reheating some chicken that a coworker had sent when the doorbell rang. By this point, everyone he knew had paid him their condolences, meaning that this could only be one of two people: Francis, having forgotten something, or Matthew, here to suffocate him with some more brotherly love.

Instead, it was Elizabeth. Alfred's mother.

The little woman frowned at him from behind her glasses and he inwardly groaned. She was gong to scold him now for refusing her visits, wasn't she?

Then he noticed the slight trembling of her bottom lip, the way her vibrant green eyes filled with tears. When she spoke, her entire face transformed from its usual scowl to an expression of complete and utter loss.

"Did you truly think you were too old to need your mum?" She tried to keep her tone biting, remain true to character, but instead she ended up sounding like a soft old woman. Which, Alfred realized with a start, she actually was now. This epiphany reminded him of another one he'd had, back when he was seventeen. He'd been going through a rebellious stage, and at one point, during a fight with his mother, he had squared his shoulders, reared up, and shouted, "I hate you!" Her recoiling to his comment had made her seem so much smaller, and at that moment, Alfred had realized that he had actually grown a head taller and become broader shouldered than his once imperialistic mother. She could truly do nothing, physically, to stop him from doing anything.

Now, in the present, Alfred wrapped his arms around his mother, her tears causing a few to involuntarily spark in his own eyes. "Mom," he sniffed, "I'm so glad you're here."

"Silly boy," she scolded. Or, tried to. He could feel the warmth radiating from her. "You sure didn't seem to want me here every time I asked. But I just..." She halted, getting choked up. "I just couldn't let you go through this alone. So I came, anyway."

"I'm glad you did," he said, his attempt at chuckling muffled by a sob into her shoulder. "I'm really glad."

Eventually, a complaint from Elizabeth caused the two to go inside, and Alfred led his mother into the kitchen. There they sat, mother and son, alone together for the first time since Matthew had come to live with them in high school. They talked about idle things while Alfred almost instinctively put on tea for her, setting the coffee maker to brew a batch of cappuccino for himself. Surprisingly, their conversation only lulled when the kettle began to scream. Alfred stood to pour some tea for Elizabeth, however she declined and went to get it on her own.

"How are you dealing?" she asked, softly, deftly lifting her cup to her lips. His eyes paused in their inspection of her to fall to the table.

Alfred was tired of telling people he was fine. Steeling his breathing, he uttered, "I feel like... my heart's been torn out of my chest... and a big hole's just been left there to bleed and decay."

His mother seemed unsurprised by this answer. Her lips pressed into something reminiscent of a pitying grimace. "Sounds about right."

The coffee maker beeped. Elizabeth fetched her protesting son a cup before returning to her spot by the counter. A hush fell over the two, Alfred's mother taking dainty sips while her son swallowed his burning drink in huge gulps, trying to quell the tears threatening to render him immobile. He couldn't cry now. He needed to be able to talk about this.

Finally, Alfred set the empty cup down, taking a moment to catch his breath before he asked his mother question.

"Mom." She looked up. Alfred met her gaze. "How did you deal when Lou died?"

Elizabeth's face went from curious to shocked within moments. "Alfred!" she cried, her tone horrified. "How could you _say_ that?"

He crinkled his brow at her. "What? Say what?"

"He was your _father!_" She said, English accent giving an extra authoritative tone to her anger. "He loved you and Matthew as if you boys were his own! _Especially_ you!"

Watching her now, hands gripping the tops of dark cabinets, Alfred was reminded of how demanding and full of anger his mother had been in youth. Her heaving shoulders and fiery green eyes seemed for a moment to be that of a young woman, trapped in a marriage with a young man who loved her but whom she did not love back; trapped in a motherhood to two boys, one of whose father had vanished; and trapped in a country she could not begin to understand.

Alfred sighed. "Mom, I still don't understand what's wrong."

Her lip trembled. "You say that as if you didn't mourn at _all_ when Loud died!"

Her voice shrilled over the "all", and when she was done speaking, she began to do as her son had earlier and rapidly swallowed down her tea.

"Of course I mourned, Mom, but it isn't the same," Alfred said lamely. "I didn't know him that well."

He thought of his mother's husband, a quiet Scottish man, holding the boys awkwardly and only when asked. Alfred thought of him working, of him watching the boys play with a beer in his hand and grunting a refusal to participate. Lou had looked much the same, Elizabeth had told her son once, when she had told him that Alfred wasn't his son, and then again when telling him that she was pregnant with yet another man's child. He hadn't thrown a fuss or seemed bothered at all; he merely pledged to take car of her, once and again.

Lou hadn't been nearly passionate enough for Alfred nor Elizabeth's demanding natures; it wasn't until the end that Alfred's mother had shown any appreciation for him at all.

Wiping her eyes, Elizabeth set her cup on the counter and then turned back to her son. She folded her hands in front of her lap as she stood, back pin-straight. "You 'didn't know him that well'," she repeated, shaking her head. "I _never_."

"Well, did _you?_" Alfred asked, frowning.

She looked thoughtful. "No. I suppose I didn't, either." She smirked, eyes sad. "There. Are you happy, Alfred?"

"No," he confessed. He didn't want this to be like all the other times spent in his mother's company. He didn't want to fight . Hoping she'd simmer down, he stared at his cup and tried not to make eye contact for a while. Luckily, his mother felt the same way, and after a moment she came over to the table to sit beside him. She drew her chair up close, so she could stroke his hair. Gradually, Alfred let himself lean into the touch until his head was resting on her shoulder.

"When does it stop hurting?"

"It never stops hurting," she replied, fingers twisting in the many yellow strands. "You just learn to live around it."

...

Alfred had had to drive around for a while before he could find the entrance to the park. It was his first time visiting since moving here; funny, seeing as it'd always been a frequent haunt of Arthur's. Alfred was real outdoorsy, too. It was just that he'd never really thought about, or appreciated, that he was so close to such a place, full of nature and human socializing. As he trod past a decline, looking down into the basin of it where a mother and some children were feeding ducks in a meager pond, he felt at peace. Nervous, because of what he was about to share with Francis. But also peaceful, too.

Finding the right bench took a while, and Alfred nearly panicked, thinking he was lost, until he made it over a path on a hill, and just a few yards away by some mulberry trees he saw Francis. He looked fuller about the face than Alfred ever remembered seeing him (a good thing, seeing as he'd been skeletal before), and he was wearing tasteful clothing for a chilly spring day. If any stranger were to walk by him right now, they'd think he was totally normal, Alfred mused.

There was an elderly man sitting beside him on the bench, and Francis shrugged as though to say, What can you do? With a good-natured smile to both men, Alfred sat down on the other side of the stranger and began to wait.

Eventually, the elderly man hobbled off. Francis and Alfred did not close the space between them or even really look at each other. Out of the corner of their eyes, they watched, hoping that the other would begin first.

Because he didn't trust Francis, Alfred decided to start. "So. Let's start with how long you knew him."

"A long time," Francis said. He paused as if to count, but then gave up. "Since we were small children, anyway. It doesn't matter the exact number of years. It was most of our lives."

It felt weird putting it into words. Words were s concrete; it had always just _been_. It hadn't needed any confirmation or definition. "It" being... What? Their lives together? That sounded as if they belonged to one another. Now Francis felt even sadder than before.

He realized that Alfred's eyes were on him still, silently begging for him to go on. He was totally unaware of Francis's conflict. Then again, was that a bad thing?

"Tell me what he was like," Alfred coaxed. The blue of his iris seemed sadder than usual. "As a kid."

"Bossy," Francis snorted. He warmed at the memory of a pint-sized Arthur with his hands on his hips, ordering Antonio to stay out of the new sand box because it was his now, and anyone who wanted to play in it would need his permission. Naturally, Francis was never invited in, but he went anyway.

He looked at Alfred's eager face. _Just this one memory, please._ And he kept the thought to himself.

But he shared others, and without the resistance he expected to have. Alfred's eyes crinkled at the corners from his smiling at the stories, as though he were sharing in the recollection of these precious moments.

"Bossy," Alfred laughed. "It doesn't surprise me. Arthur was always a little bossy. I loved it. Sometimes."

Francis nodded in agreement, a smile tugging on his lips more easily than he wanted it to. "Ha, ha, yes. You're right."

A thought suddenly occurred to him. His smile faded, taking Alfred's with it. "No. Wait. Not always."

"What do you mean?" the other man implored. He could obviously sense Francis's distress. Anxious, he pushed his glasses up his face.

Francis hesitated. Arthur wouldn't want this - it was just too personal. It was a violation of his privacy, and he had been all about privacy.

_But it doesn't matter what he _might have_ wanted,_ Francis suddenly thought. _Arthur's not here anymore_.

"When we were in kindergarten," Francis began, "Arthur was a relatively meek kid. Cried all the time - partly because he was spoiled rotten, partly because he was depressed about his mother having remarried. I didn't really know that, though. I just knew I didn't like his face when he cried. So I teased him to keep him occupied, so that he wouldn't cry. And it worked."

Francis recounted what must have been his entire life to Alfred in that quiet afternoon. And if it wasn't his entire life, it was at least the most precious moments. He wasn't just letting slip the occasional piece of his own life, as one is want to do when telling a story for his own point of view.

Nevertheless, Alfred greedily captured every word, savoring it. Even when Francis got to the parts about college, he listened carefully, and he didn't tell Francis to stop or get back to the point when he began to talk about what his life had been like without Arthur, searching for him. Alfred saw that Francis needed to vent, and so he let him. The only place where he drew the line was the affair; even then, he let Francis describe a few instances, realizing that the vivid detail of Arthur's naked body wasn't meant to make him jealous, but for Francis himself, so that he could preserve the image, give it tangibility. At some points in the afternoon, Alfred cried, overwhelmed with emotions from memories that were not his, and then Francis would begin to cry, too.

"And that's it," Francis said eventually, meaning that it was now Alfred's turn to share. The dishwater blonde man wiped the tears out of his eyes with a shaky breath. He began to speak with considerably less confidence than Francis had. Alfred, unfortunately, was not as eloquent of a story teller, and his voice shook both from crying and with nerves as he recounted his first meeting with Arthur.

Despite his mechanical explanations and lack of a grasp of detail, Francis paid close attention. He kept his face straight and inoffensive as he listened, and eventually, Alfred gained a little more confidence in his narrative. It still wasn't phenomenal, though: Arthur had always been the one who was good with words, not him.

"I don't get it," Alfred sighed. He barely noticed that the color of the sky had by this time faded to dark orange. "He's the one who told me not to volunteer as much and try to get paid. But he still got all sad with me." He shook his head, the weight of it suddenly colossal. He'd never even confided these things in Matthew. So why did his mind feel so heavy? Shouldn't getting this off his chest make the load lighter?

Alfred hung his head, rubbing his palms into his eyes. "Maybe we were just falling out of love. That's why he cheated on me."

"No." Francis's face was solemn. "I think he still loved you," he admitted quietly.

"Then why would he do that?" Alfred asked. He put his palms out, as though to catch answers from the sky. "I don't _understand_."

Silence. Francis hesitated, unsure of if he wanted to speak. He feared how real his theory would become when put into words. He feared what it would mean for him when he did.

"I think you're wrong," Francis went on. "I think Arthur just didn't want you to give yourself away for any reason, because for good or bad, you were still giving yourself away, straining yourself. And I think Arthur had something personal to gain, too." Alfred's anxious expression gained some curiosity. "I think that by wearing yourself down, you were wearing _him_ down, because he wanted you for himself. I think he wanted you so very badly, but you weren't there."

Alfred dug his teeth into his lip, trying to stave off his tears with physical pain. He bit so hard his lip bled.

"Did he tell you any of this for sure?" he asked, an air of urgency to his voice.

Francis could only shake his head. "You know Arthur. He never talked about anything." At this, Alfred's persona wilted. Francis sighed; "But I'm sure of it. I'm absolutely positive."

Alfred nodded dully. Francis had the feeling that he didn't believe him, and said so.

"It's not that," Alfred reassured him. "It's just, what good does any of that do me now? It's too late for me to have any of that time back."

Sometime later into his story, when the sky became the dusty color of twilight, Alfred reached the touchy subject of Arthur's sickness.

"We spent every second together those last days." He watched himself wring his hands, feeling Francis's eyes on him. "We cried a lot, though we tried not to. Mostly we just focused on _be_ing. I felt so nervous just laying down with him because he seemed so weak. He was like this... this tooth-pick sized version of himself. And I..." Alfred trailed off, thinking, then lifted his face. "You know how new parents are nervous to sleep with their babies in the same bed, 'cause they're scared they'll roll over and crush them in the night?" Alfred looked at him with terrified eyes, remembering. Francis nodded. "Well, that's how I felt with Arthur. Like the littlest pressure would him. And then at the end-"

"Stop there," Francis commanded, voice hoarse. "Okay? Just stop. You've given me enough."

Alfred worried his lower lip between his teeth. "Are you sure?" He didn't wait for Francis to reply, plowing on despite the fact that the other man had opened his mouth to do just that. "Because I truly want to keep my side of the bargain. I mean, I feel like you told me stuff that was really important, and all I did was tell you how happy he... how well he got on without you."

The comment stung, but Francis steeled his nerves. Alfred was not trying to offend him. "No, I really appreciate what you told me today. It's just... I'm not ready to hear that yet. I can live without knowing how he died."

They sat in silence a moment.. Several yards away, the first of the outdoor lamps lining the asphalt path through the park the dark violet sky, a faint trace of the moon, but no stars. Not yet.

"I don't feel like I've fulfilled my promise until I tell you," Alfred said. He wasn't looking at Francis. Behind his lenses of his glasses, his eyes scanned the sky, back and forth, looking for celestial bodies.

Francis didn't want to join his search. He folded his hands in his lap and stared at them. "I am sorry. I just can't."

"That's fine." Alfred's eyes lit up with interest, which died once he realized that the shooting star he'd been following was just an airplane. "I suppose I'll just have to wait until you're ready. Until then," and now, Francis could feel his gaze resting on the side of his face, "I guess I'm the one who owes you."

He was agreeing with Francis, whether he truly believed it or not. Slowly, Francis hunched over, elbows on his knees, hands kneading through silky blonde curls. Alfred owed Francis. He had said it because he didn't need Francis. Francis needed him. And Alfred needed somebody to need him, so he had done it without making Francis lose, without making him weak. He did it by letting Francis win.

"Thank you," Francis sobbed. Because everyone occasionally needs a friend.

...

Once upon a time, there was a boy named Francis in love with another boy named Arthur.

Once upon another time, there was a young man named Alfred also in love with the young man named Arthur.

So once upon a time, Arthur had been a boy who loved another boy named Francis. Then he became a young man, and he loved another young man named Alfred.

Time passed, and the three became men. Arthur was still sure that he loved one, but not sure that he didn't love the other. And that was unfair. Then Arthur died, and Alfred and Francis, who hated each other, were left together. And that, too, was unfair.

Yet somehow, they made do. Sometimes, that's all one can ever do.

Sometimes, that's life.

...

The End

* * *

I want to give enormous thanks to my readers. Your reviews inspired me - you understood me! That makes my heart absolutely swell! And those of you who didn't were perfectly in the right, too, because life doesn't always make sense. Even those of you who didn't review but merely added this to your favorites or alerts truly warmed my heart. All of instilled me with confidence. Thank you.

I could write a novel about my experiences writing this, the many messages and symbols hidden throughout, but I won't. I want you to interpret it for yourselves and find your own meaning in it. I will give you this, though: Alfred's mother is Igiko. I felt female England was only appropriate, given that many historians - and historic figures, such as Thomas Paine - have tended to compare the relationship between America and England to that of a mother and her child. Whether this reflects at all on Alfred's relationship with Arthur is entirely up to you. I'm not a fan of Freud myself.

Well, I love you all, and I hope that this little story made for a nice reprieve. :)


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